Area Must Embrace Mass Transit

September 21, 1987

Ed Kennedy is a voice crying in the wilderness, singing a sad song that makes some people wince and hold their ears. But South Floridians ignore him at their peril, because inevitably, they must learn to dance to his tune.

The Broward County commissioner`s message, and that of other sensible, progressive leaders confronting the future with realism, is simple:

Local residents need to get the mass transit habit. They need to stop depending so much on their private cars to get around and prepare to start riding buses, trams, vans, jitneys, commuter trains, bullet trains, monorails and people movers.

To stimulate that habit, the politicians need to approve and taxpayers need to subsidize a comprehensive, interconnected mass transit system. To work, it must be practical and convenient, with popular schedules and routes, well- maintained equipment, reasonable prices, adequate government funding, reliable service and safe drivers.

Such a system is a must:

-- If people in the tri-county region are to avoid strangling on their own auto exhaust pollution.

-- If commuting time is to be kept to limits the human body and mind can endure.

-- If drivers are to escape total highway gridlock and intolerable risks of accident, injury and death.

-- If taxpayers are to avoid being bankrupted.

-- And if people are to have any way of getting around in the 21st century.

As a member of the Tricounty Commuter Rail Organization (TCRO), Kennedy is on the cutting edge of efforts to provide mass transit. The TCRO is working hard to meet a July 1, 1988, deadline to begin commuter rail service for workers in Palm Beach, Broward and Dade counties. The 18 train cars will haul 14,000 passengers a day on a 64-mile route linking West Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Fort Lauderdale and Miami.

The train`s purpose is twofold: First, to ease congestion during widening of I-95 from six to 10 lanes, work that may double or triple usual travel times. Second, to introduce people to the mass transit habit.

Although the commuter rail will only handle a tiny fraction of I-95 users, Kennedy expects that this limited train service will be so popular that it will soon be expanded, along with other forms of mass transit.

Continued reliance on the private auto as the main means of transportation leads to a bleak future in the early 21st century, when the region`s population is expected to soar from 3.5 million to 9 million.

To cope with the increased number of drivers, I-95 would have to be widened to 17 lanes, but there isn`t enough money anywhere to pay for it, nor enough room to expand it. Meanwhile, air pollution from so much traffic would be intolerable.

Getting the mass transit habit requires a radical shift in attitudes, by car owners, taxpayers, government planners and politicians.

``Our mindset in Florida is all road-oriented,`` Kennedy said. ``One of my thrusts is to change that.``

The time to start making that change is now. Providing and attracting passengers to a decent mass transit system requires more than just champions like Ed Kennedy; it requires thousands of people to start heeding those voices like his, crying in the wilderness.